The Puffins

these guys were my band. during my formulative years of establishing an avid interest in new zealand music, no band were more important than the startling christchurch band, the puffins. i’d sneak into the dux (at age 15, whilst the law was still 20) and party for 2 hours straight to the abosulte best live band christchurch has seen since the golden age of the clean.some people described lindon puffin as the missing link between split enz and the beatles. i thought they were more than that.for half a decade this wonderful 4-piece (who went through a number of line-up changes, though mostly based on lindon puffin (gat/vox) j.r. the bear (bass), viper conway (drums) and lake vincent(keys)) continued to play and revise their brilliantly crafted new-wave-synth-bizarro-pop music, seldom releasing recordings. they did, however, gain recognition locally through their infamous ‘lighthouse’ single, unlucky appearance on the ‘showcase’ performance show and lindon’s eventual radio persona. in the late 90s lindon began finally committing to tape the songs that had made them so vital, just as the band was starting to crumble round the edges.a recording session of mammoth proportions (for a self-funded, independently produced recording) the band locked them selves up in a former hospital in rural rotherham (north canterbury) and